Cherry, Annie Moore

By Ralph Hardee Rives, 1979

21 Sept. 1891–1 Feb. 1976

Annie Moore Cherry, educator, daughter of William Rodney and Elizabeth Eleanor Moore Cherry, was born in Martin County but spent most of her early life in Hobgood and Scotland Neck, Halifax County, where she received her earliest education. She was graduated from the State Normal and Industrial School, now The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, in 1912 and in 1927 received the master of arts degree in education from Columbia University; afterwards she did further graduate work at Columbia, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Duke University.

Miss Cherry's first teaching position was in Dunn, where she remained for four years. After brief service as rural elementary school supervisor for Harnett County, she became the first full-time rural elementary school supervisor in Halifax County in 1918 where she remained until 1933. During that time she worked with local home demonstration agents to develop hot lunch programs for rural schools and with educational personnel to introduce progressive teaching techniques. In 1921 she and Alonzo E. Akers, county school superintendent, wrote the script and directed teachers and pupils of the county in the presentation in Weldon of a pageant, The Spirit of the Roanoke, A Pageant of Halifax County History . Elizabeth Lay (Mrs. Paul) Green, who assisted in the production, termed the pageant "a worthy pioneer in North Carolina in Rural Community Drama by co-operative authorship."

Miss Cherry, after several years during which she was engaged in research with the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, joined the faculty of Flora MacDonald College in Red Springs as professor of education and supervisor of student teachers in the elementary grades. She also taught in summer school at Western Carolina University, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Duke University, and The University of North Carolina at Greensboro. She frequently spoke before state and national educational organizations and was the author of a number of bulletins on school supervision. She was the third woman to serve as president of the North Carolina Education Association. She was both a trustee and president of the alumnae association of The University of North Carolina at Greensboro as well as a trustee of the Consolidated University of North Carolina. She was a member of Delta Kappa Gamma, honorary sorority for women educators.

Although she was a member of Enfield United Methodist Church she was buried in Trinity Episcopal Church Cemetery, Scotland Neck.